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NASA's new Mars Exploration Program: the trajectory of knowledgeNASA's newly restructured Mars Exploration Program (MEP) is finally on the way to Mars with the successful April 7 launch of the 2001 Mars Odyssey Orbiter. In addition, the announcement by the Bush Administration that the exploration of Mars will be a priority within NASA's Office of Space Science further cements the first decade of the new millennium as one of the major thrusts to understand the "new" Mars. Over the course of the past year and a half, an integrated team of managers, scientists, and engineers has crafted a revamped MEP to respond to the scientific as well as management and resource challenges associated with deep space exploration of the Red Planet. This article describes the new program from the perspective of its guiding philosophies, major events, and scientific strategy. It is intended to serve as a roadmap to the next 10-15 years of Mars exploration from the NASA viewpoint. [For further details, see the Mars Exploration Program web site (URL): http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov]. The new MEP will certainly evolve in response to discoveries, to successes, and potentially to setbacks as well. However, the design of the restructured strategy is attentive to risks, and a major attempt to instill resiliency in the program has been adopted. Mars beckons, and the next decade of exploration should provide the impetus for a follow-on decade in which multiple sample returns and other major program directions are executed. Ultimately the vision to consider the first human scientific expeditions to the Red Planet will be enabled. By the end of the first decade of this program, we may know where and how to look for the elusive clues associated with a possible martian biological record, if any was every preserved, even if only as "chemical fossils.".
Document ID
20040087972
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Garvin, J. B.
(NASA Headquarters Washington, DC United States)
Figueroa, O.
Naderi, F. M.
Date Acquired
August 21, 2013
Publication Date
December 1, 2001
Publication Information
Publication: Astrobiology
Volume: 1
Issue: 4
ISSN: 1531-1074
Subject Category
Lunar And Planetary Science And Exploration
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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